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Jazz arranging, round two

It's been a busy few months. Among other things, I've been finishing up my second semester of jazz arranging at UNT, which included two major projects I'd now like to share here.

First, I've written my first big band arrangement since high school. The assignment was to arrange a jazz standard, so I chose an old favorite of mine: Rogers and Hart's I Could Write a Book. The following recording was done by the UNT Three O'Clock Lab Band last week; I believe the trombone soloist is David Winniford.

I Could Write a Book

I felt pretty good about the project overall. Still a few things I'd fix if I had it played again, though—for one thing, I don't think I really understand how to use the trumpet section in the middle register. For a first go-round, though, this isn't half bad.

Immediately following the big band project, we were assigned something a bit simpler: write an original 32(ish)-bar tune, get it recorded, and turn in the lead sheet. I named my project "Like Waking Up," which is how I've sometimes described the experience of studying music again after such a long hiatus. The personnel on this recording are me on trombone, Tim Chernikoff on piano, Cliff Chen on bass, and Greg Sadler on drums.

Like Waking Up

Also, for what it's worth, I've added a Facebook "Like" button to all of my blog pages; if you enjoyed these recordings and you want to share them with your friends, click the button and a link to this blog post should show up in your Facebook news feed. At least I think that's how it works; haven't really tested it yet :)